


i will leave the woods that bore me (and I will wander, lost)

by Timballisto



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Also Sadness, F/F, F/M, lots of worldbuilding, prepare yourself for worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-19
Updated: 2015-05-19
Packaged: 2018-03-31 05:53:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3966832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Timballisto/pseuds/Timballisto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>I will leave, I will leave the woods that bore me;</em>
  <br/>
  <em>For our days are ending and our years failing.</em>
  <br/>
  <em>I will pass the wide waters lonely sailing.</em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Clarke, Lexa, and healing water.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i will leave the woods that bore me (and I will wander, lost)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AvaRosier](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AvaRosier/gifts).



> this is for AvaRosier because she won a fic challenge so here you go. It's not done yet, but this chapter was almost 20 pages long so... yeah.

She felt like a scavenger. She picked at the bones of dead kills, filling her pockets full of bloodied, half-eaten remains. The sharp edge of hunger in Clarke’s stomach reminded her of the first days at the dropship, before the 100 figured out how to feed themselves. It felt almost something like nostalgia.

Sometimes, when she couldn't start a fire, and she ate it raw like an animal. Mud and blood were smeared over her face and mouth; Clarke avoided her reflection in the river, unable to hold her own gaze. She looked like a reaper. Like a killer.

She only threw up once.

* * *

Clarke walked nowhere in particular for two weeks. She wandered south, following the curve of the river, keeping it on her right and never straying too far into the woods that grew marshier and swampier the deeper she went.

Though the river seemed shallow in some places, with huge boulders splitting the wide river into smaller parts before they bled together again, Clarke stayed wary. There were parts of the water too wide for her to see the other side as more than a distant, hazy line of trees; Clarke didn't want to find out if the fish grew big enough to match.

On the fourth day of walking, the carefully rationed water in her canteen ran out and she forced herself to drink from the river. The water was just palatable enough for Clarke to force down, but she was able to taste the beginnings of salt in it.

She’d never seen the ocean before.

For the first time in days she felt something other than mechanical numbness. She could smell the sea on the wind. The humidity was oppressive without those weak little breezes that brought the fresh air to her nose, and Clarke relished it. It cooled her sweaty skin, prickling at the frizzing hairs at the nape of her neck and chilling her damp clothing.

The ground beneath her feet gave way from loam and leaves and tall oaks to scrubby pines and grainy crumbling dirt. She had sand in every crevice of her boots and a blister forming on every one of her toes. 

It had been 13 days since Mount Weather.

Clarke tried not to think about it as she walked. She focused on putting one foot in front of the other, letting her mind slip into monotony because it felt good to not think for a while. It frightened her, how much she yearned for her cell in the Skybox. It was uncomplicated; no one expected much from her, no one looked to her for direction, and she didn’t have to kill anyone.

She counted her footsteps. _Right, left, right, left-_

She counted the days she’d been on the ground in her head. There were so few of them, compared to the number of people she’d killed. Clarke tried to count those too, but stopped when the numbers started reaching upwards of 700 and her breath started feeling tight in her chest.

She went back to counting her steps.  


* * *

Clarke heard the whimpering first.

She stepped out of the underbrush, blinking in the intensity of the sun without the patchy shade of the pines to filter it. The clearing was small, half marsh and half meadow and it smelled like rotting plants and blood.

Clarke’s hand went to her gun, the _click_ of the safety loud against the silence. She moved carefully, skirting the tall grass. Her hand tightened on the cool grip of her pistol.

Her foot came down on a twig, and Clarke stiffened. The whimpering stopped.

 _“...sis ai!”_ The sound transformed from something ambiguously animal, into a voice.

Clarke started, almost dropping her gun. She hadn't heard a human voice since she'd left Camp Jaha behind, and the suddenness of it had her heart hammering in her chest. Still cautious, she followed the soft crying to its source.

There was an animal pit, like the one she’d nearly fallen into during the mission to rescue Jasper so many months ago. She was barely able to see the edge, and she moved carefully over open ground to get a closer look. She tested each step before putting her weight on it; she had no intention of finding her own end at the bottom of a stake pit. Clarke dropped onto her stomach, digging the toes of her boots into the dirt as she peered over the edge.

It was a little girl. It was hard to see the true damage, but Clarke was able to see the bloody ends of three spikes jutting from her body. There were other wounds, jagged and bleeding from where her skin caught and tore on the tips of the sharpened wooden spears that jutted from the ground.

She looked like a butterfly, pinned and struggling.

Her eyes met Clarke’s, and they flared with relief, and then fear. The girl babbled something, struggling against the stakes that pin her down like a wounded animal. The movement did nothing but exacerbate her wounds and caused the girl to yelp in pain.

“Stop!” Clarke yelled, her fingers digging into the grass at the edge of the pit. The girl ignored her, continuing to struggle; Clarke was able to see the sheen of sweat on the girl’s forehead and the pale white of her skin beneath the blood. “All you’ll do is make it worse-” Clarke’s tongue felt heavy and clumsy in her mouth, and she wished she knew more grounder, if only to keep this girl from killing herself. “Stop! _Hod- Hod op!_ ”

The girl stilled, breathing hard. Her eyes rolled in her head, and Clarke was able to see the whites of them clearly, even in the shadow of the pit. Clarke didn't even know if the grounder girl spoke Trigedasleng, let alone her broken mixture of phrases and English.

 _“Ai fis yu op_.” Clarke said, pointing at herself and the bloodied spears. “ _Sis yu au._ ”

The tension in the grounder girl’s body eased slightly.

Clarke pulled back over the edge. Helping the girl meant having to go towards one of the columns of smoke she’d so carefully avoided until now. She’d been very good about avoiding settlements and people- but helping this girl meant the end of that hard won solitude. The girl whimpered again, and Clarke shook those thoughts from her head. For all her sins, at the very least she couldn't be accused apathy.

Clarke slipped into the pit, long tufts of grass wrapped around her hands to keep her from pitching forward. It was more shallow than she'd estimated it to be, only coming up to her shoulders, but still too far for her to climb out with the injured girl slung over her back.

She kicked over the remaining stakes, moving her way over to the quivering girl. The grounder almost started thrashing again when Clarke took her knife out of her pocket. She quieted when Clarke plucked her blood soaked clothes away from her skin and slit the fabric rather than her throat.

“I’m just going to see how you’re hurt, okay?” she murmured, gesturing toward the bleeding gashes on the girls legs. She moved slowly, keeping her voice low and soft. The ruined pieces of the girls loose shirt were taken piece by piece to help bind the torn flesh of the girls legs from near misses with the sharp stakes near her calves.

Clarke was not sure what to do about the stakes piercing the girl’s shoulder, hip, and side. As much as she'd had to act like it, Clarke was no surgeon, and there'd been no stake pits on the Ark. The stakes were too thick to snap with her hands, and they were too long to stay in as they were. She needed to cut the beneath the girls body to separate her from the ground as well as the tips to avoid getting stabbed herself when she tried to drag the kid out. Clarke grasped the pole, slick with blood, and swallowed the bile rising in the back of her throat. _Oh god, the smell of blood in the air was just like-_ Clarke gritted her teeth and brought her knife down on the wet wood.

The pain from the vibrations and movement of the stake in her shoulder was intense enough that by the twentieth or thirtieth pass of Clarke's knife, the girl let out a short little scream and passed out. She would probably be better for it, in the long run.

As Clarke worked, the girl's eyes fluttered. Her lips moved, little gasping breaths escaping from her lungs as she wheezed in and out of consciousness. She was crying, tears dripping form her eyes and making tracks through the blood and dust that coated her young face.

 _“Ai gonplei stei odon._ ” The girl sobbed, her hand clutching at Clarke’s jacket weakly. It tugged at what remained of Clarke’s heartstrings, the way this girl was resigned to death. She couldn't be more than 12 years old and she was already begging Clarke for mercy.

And Clarke could do it. She could take her knife and let the life blood out of this little girl, singing her sweetly to sleep as she brushed the hair off of her forehead. She’d been able to do that with Atom; and it had been a long time since she’d thought of that boy. Clarke hadn’t even had nightmares after she’d killed him, safe and secure in the knowledge that it’d been a mercy killing, and that she’d saved him the pain and agony of a slow death from infection.

How terrible a person do you have to be to almost forget the name of the first person you’d ever killed?

Clarke knew.

So she shook her head at the girls tear stained face. “I need your spirit to stay where it is.” 

* * *

Clarke had to dig a rough set of stairs into the side of the pit with one of the stakes in order to carry her out of the pit to level ground.

“ _Ai laik_... Clarke.” Clarke panted, shifting the girl on her back. She could feel the slow spread of damp blood on her shoulders from Arlo's tiny frame.

The girl groaned. “ _Ai l-laik Arlo_.”

And then she was quiet for a good long while. Her breath wheezed in Clarke’s ear as she walked. Clarke honestly had no idea where this girl was from, and any garbled directions Arlo could give wouldn’t do her any good anyway- so she walked instead. There was a marked trail worn by feet leading from the area of the stake pits, and Clarke followed it with the hopes that it would lead her to something. Anything.

Hopefully, not the wrong end of a spear.

She walked for two, maybe three hours. Arlo’s grip on her back slackened dangerously and Clarke’s shirt was soaked through with her blood. The slickness of it made it difficult for Clarke to keep her grip on Arlo’s thighs and keep her from falling backwards onto the forest floor.

Only. It wasn't a forest, anymore.

Clarke broke from the treeline. The scrubby grass and mess of pine needles beneath her feet gave way to pure sand. In front of her, there was nothing but dunes and sparse dune grass that bends with the refreshing breeze. And though Clarke couldn't see it, she could hear it and smell it.

The ocean.

Clarke walked faster, pushing her legs against the give of the sand and the steepness of the dunes, cresting it and getting her first good look at the sea.  
It was beautiful. Clarke had imagined the sea while on the Ark, but she had never captured the enormity of it. It stretched from horizon to horizon, endless and big. And the colors of it, the crash of the waves as they hit the shore-

Clarke stood shock still for a few minutes before a weak groan in her ear brought her back to herself. She dragged her eye from the ocean and looked up and down the coast, her eyes squinting against the sun. If there were any villages near here, the coast would be the perfect-

There. 

Clarke was able to see a plum of faint white-grey smoke, its source out of sight and hidden by the slight curve of the beach. She turned and started walking. She’d have time for the ocean later. Hopefully.

And she was lucky that not even ten minutes later, she became aware of grounders in the dunes. A hunting party, maybe? Dressed in leather and hefting heavy looking spears. They looked less intimidating than Lexa's elite guard of warriors (and even thinking Lexa's name made something pang in Clarke's chest), dressed for the heat rather than protection.

And then Clarke did something stupid. “Help!”

The group turned as one, the weapons in their hands at the ready. One of them yelled something Clarke couldn't understand.  
“ _Sis ai_!” The Trigedasleng caught in Clarke’s throat.

One of the men caught sight of Arlo on Clarke’s back, and another surged forward, pushing past the leader of the group. His bow fell to the sand, forgotten.

“Arlo!” He yelled, darting forward with hands outstretched. Clarke let him take the girl, making sure that the way the man was holding her wouldn’t jostle the wood still protruding from her skin.

“ _Nomon_.” Arlo moaned weakly.

“ _Fisa_?” Clarke demanded, pointing at the blood that was dripping steadily to the stand. The girl was pale and barely alive, her dark skin colored a dangerous pallor.

The mans hands shook. He barked something to the rest of the hunting party before turning and loping across the sand with the girl held in his arms. Clarke watched them go.

They choose then to strike.

Clarke was tackled from behind. She went down hard, her hands and chin plowing into the sand, getting into her eyes and mouth. Clarke didn't have a chance to put up even a token amount of resistance before they dug her gun out of her waistband and ripped her knife out of her coat pocket. 

She yelped when they wrenched her arms behind her back and roughly bound them there. They aren't gentle and Clarke shut her eyes, gritting her teeth and anticipating the pain of a knife between the ribs, or a club over the head. It never came. Instead she’s frog marched along the beach. By the hour mark she was gasping, her calves screaming from the effort to walk in the loose sand. Her throat was parched dry and the sun off of the ocean through the glimpses she catches through the dunes were blinding.

There were others on the beach. The longer they walked, the more people Clarke saw. Grounders wearing minimal armor, tattooed more heavily than the Trigedakru and often knee deep in the surf with spear and net in hand called out to Clarke's escort as they passed. Clarke wasn't sure how they dared to stand so carelessly in the ocean; the creatures that had lurked beneath the surface of the river were surely nothing compared to the monsters the lurked in the deep. But they stared at her, unafraid, until her escort forced her onward.

She saw shapes in the hazy distance, but the heat was too intense and the mirage too uncertain for her to even guess at what they were. Clarke didn't have much time to try and figure it out either before her head was forced down unexpectedly. There’s was gnarled tree sequestered among the dunes, and her guards crowd her beneath the shadow of the roots. There were concrete steps, with a grate set over the top of it that they slam shut after her. It looks like the remains of a storm drain; the concrete cracked and split by the roots of the tree above. 

Part of Clarke, the part that'd made Emerson walk the 8 hours in 6, that'd led the assault on Mt Weather, that'd looked a young warlord in the face and called her weak; part of Clarke wanted to fight, to scream, to rattle the grate until her guards came for her. Instead, she settled in the corner, facing the single exit, and waited.

Better captured than dead.  


* * *

She spent 3 days in that cell. The sand beneath her boots was always damp, and despite the heat outside, it was always cool in her prison. She wasn't tortured, but she wasn't exactly treated well—it was a sobering reminder that these Grounders weren't Trigedakru, and she wasn't under the Commander’s protection anymore.

It left a bad taste in her mouth.

She was fed, at least. Everyday, a cup of water and a hunk of rough bread was left for her to eat; hunger gnawed at her stomach but hunger was a familiar and constant companion and not nearly as debilitating as she'd imagined on the Ark. Being hungry made her brave enough to ask her guards questions. Usually she received a blow or a kick for her pains, but occasionally...

“Please—the little girl,” Clarke tried to ask. The man who left food in her cell avoided her eyes, ignoring her or unable to understand. “Arlo?” Clakre tried again, grasping through the bars at the hem of his rough tunic. The uncertainty of the little girls’ life was eating at her; her jacket, discarded in the corner, still smelled like her blood.

He stopped, looking at her for the first time since he began bringing her food. “Alive.” he said, in stilted English. He brushed her hand from his person and left her there in the dark.

Clarke felt a little lighter anyway.

On the fourth day, they came for Clarke. She stumbled to her feet as an unfamiliar warrior led her out of her cell into the sunlight. They all wore bone masks and spears—and Clarke was reminded of the dropship with a sickening lurch of her stomach.

She didn't try to resist; one of the grounders bound her hands in front of her while another watched her like a hawk with a dagger at the ready. His stance clearly said that he would love nothing more than an excuse to cut her throat.

Clarke walked from a cell into the unknown.

Again.

* * *

The sun went down an hour ago, but it's almost too bright under the light of the full moon. She took a deep breath, her eyes drawn to the glittering silver of the water. Clarke supposed she takes too long staring, because she earned a sharp poke with a spear for her troubles. She was walked down the beach, a warrior on each side and the dangerous point of that spear pricking the small of her back. The ocean is on her right, the waves lapping at the sand. She tried not to get caught staring at it, but it was difficult to ignored the gilded silver of moonlight on the waves.

Eventually they left the beach, following a path invisible to Clarke’s unpracticed eyes, and cutting through the scrubby pine forest. The patchy light from the moon filters through the needles, giving Clarke no amount of grief as she stumbled on protruding roots and tufts of grass. She felt blind and she couldn’t help the shiver that started at the base of her spine and slid onto her shoulders. Even in her cell under the tree there was always some source of light—be it her guard’s fire at night, or the light of the moon through the grate. This cloying darkness that pressed on her mouth was almost unbearable. 

“Keep up.” One of her escorts grunted, giving her a firm push forward. Clarke noted bitterly that none of her guards were having any issues with footing.  
The ground was getting steeper as they walked, heading steadily uphill. Clarke concentrated on that instead of the dark, breathing harshly through her nose and mouth.

And then they crested the hill, and broke from the tree line at the same time, and Clarke finally saw her destination.

“Holy shit.” Clarke breathed.

It was a _ship_.

Even from a mile away, Clarke could see the enormity of it. It towered above the industrial remains of a city, the tangled sprawl of concrete intermingled with sand dunes and sea grass. The body of the ship was peppered with pinpricks of light from torches, moving this way and that like ants over a carcass in the gathering dusk. The windows of the command tower, intact and the highest point of the ship, glowed with light. There were countless fires on the deck, making the entire structure look as if it was aflame and sinking against the dark backdrop of the water beyond. 

As they walked, what Clarke believed to be nothing but broken ruins, turned out to be homes. Faces peered out of huts made of scrap and driftwood, eyeing Clarke and the warriors before turning back into the shadow of their own houses. Clarke had never seen so many people gathered together before in her entire life; even the people of TonDC seemed sparse in comparison. 

The grassy hill gave way to sand, and then to the broken remains of asphalt, and then sand again as they slipped closer to the old ship. The urban sprawl pushed right up against the side of the ship, brushing against the base like waves. Firmly in its shadow, Clarke realized she vastly underestimated the size of the thing. It just seemed to get taller and taller—so tall that her neck burned as she craned her head to get a better look. Clarke vaguely recognized the shape from the WWII movies she’d seen as a kid, and wondered how the mammoth of an old world aircraft carrier hadn’t drifted away with 100 years of currents. 

When she’s close enough to see the base of the ship, she recieved her answer. The warship wasn't in the water at all; it was cradled in a long narrow berth, held in place by scaffolding and rope. On one cracked cement wall half hidden behind the prow, Clarke was able to make out the faded words ‘DRY DOCK 15’.  


The grounder in charge of the party kept her from dawdling with another pointed shove between her shoulder blades. He led the way, snaking his way through debris and keeping to the moonshadow silhouette of the ship. They walked for some minutes along the side before they reached the base of a scaffold that leaned against the towering metal hull. He called up to some unseen sentry, and apparently received an acceptable reply because he began to climb the rough wooden ladder to the top of the tower.

Clarke was pushed none too gently toward the ladder, stumbling when her boots slip in the sand. Her hands were unbound, and she began to climb. She didn't dare look down; something told her that exploring the irony of a girl born in space who’s afraid of heights wasn't something to attempt. She scrambled off the ladder just in time to see the lead grounder help secure a bridge from the top of the scaffold (buffeted by wind and creaking ominously) to the deck of the warship, his actions mirrored by another group of grounders across the gap. There was a distinct lack of handrails.

“No.” Clarke croaked. She couldn't—she was brave but she wasn't stupid. 

The lead grounder’s face was thunderous. He pointed, barking something Clarke could easily interpret as a command.

“No.” Clarke repeated, her mouth set in a mulish line. She made the mistake of accidentally peering over the edge and felt her stomach roil. The ground was so far away. She turned to go back down the ladder, but there was already a warrior behind her, blocking the way.

Clarke swallows. Fuck.

“Just don’t look down. Again.” She mumbled to herself, her breathing shallow. “It’s dark. You’re about to walk across a two-foot wide bridge, a few hundred feet in the air. No problem. You’ve survive a hundred-year-old dropship landing.” Clarke took her first step. “Of course, you were wearing a seatbelt. But. Same concept, right?” She took another.

The wind picked up, and Clarke quickened her pace. She didn't want to be caught by the wind—and as if to laugh at her prayer, a sudden gust made her jacket flap threateningly, pulling her off balance. For one, heartstopping moment, she pinwheeled her arms over empty space. Her heart clanged in her chest, choking her throat with fear.  
Before she had the chance to scream, one of the warriors grabbed her arm to keep her from pitching over the edge-he said something to the others and they laughed; Clarke felt her ears burning.

“Asshole.” she muttered under her breath. Not low enough apparently, because the warrior holding her arm lets go to cuff her over the head. She let it go, her limbs still shaky with her brush with death.

She noticed, with bitterness, that none of the warriors (even the younger ones who look to be a few years younger than her) have any issue crossing after her. They pulled the plank after the last warrior crosses, dashing any hope Clarke may have had to escape that route.

Instead, they lead her across the rough surface of the deck to the base of the command tower, weaving through the fires. There were scores of grounders, their faces half obscured by shadow, and they paid her only the slightest of attention as she passed by with her escort.

Clarke didn't know whether to take comfort, or fear from that.

There were stairs, leading upwards. Some of the metal seemed original, but other steps were replaced with wood scaffolding and metal. Their steps were cacophonous inside the narrow stairwell. At the top, two guards flanked a heavy metal door. A rap on the metal was met with a barked command, and the door was opened. 

The interior looked like Lexa’s tent. The same emphasis on draping tapestries, the layered fabrics thin enough to let air in while keeping bugs out, the rush mats on the floor to cushion the step- the only thing missing was a gnarled throne of wood and a dangerous young commander. Instead, a woman sat on a dais crosslegged and stoic. 

She reminded Clarke of Anya; the same high cheekbones and angular facial features as well as the cold calculating eyes. She was darker than any of the Trigedakru Clarke had ever seen. darker than even Wells and his father. Her hair fell around her face in tight braids that reached her shoulders. Her braids were threaded with trinkets; Clarke didn’t know that grounders even valued such things anymore, but she could make out the glint of gold and silver woven into the woman’s hair, and the metallic sheen of sea shells at her ears.

Despite the opulence of her adornments, she wore nothing close to the grounder armor Clarke had become accustomed to- this leader wore nothing more than linen pants and a bandeau. Tattoos snaked over every visible square inch of her body; serpents, entwined and bloody, circled over her shoulders while pictographs of fighting warriors played over her biceps and forearms. Hypnotic swirls of ink began at her collarbone and spilled down to her abdomen; it hurt Clarke’s eyes to follow them, and her eyes slid in and out of focus when she tried.

She took this all in in the seconds before she was shoved to her hands and knees.

“You come speaking the language of the Maunon.” the women said. Her voice was deep, deeper than Clarke expected. “You wear the clothes of the Maunon. You have the coloring of the Maunon.”

Clarke’s breath caught in her chest.

“Yet you stand before me and do not burn. You carry a gun, but do not use it. And you have saved the life of my niece.”

Clarke relaxed. The only word she’d had of Arlo had been a vague assertion of her continued breath, which didn’t mean much if infection set in.

“You are relieved.” The woman noted. “But saving the life of one will not absolve your people of their crimes.”

“Wait-!” Clarke was cut off by a boot between her shoulder blades, sending her flying forward. Her teeth clicked together and sharp pain branched from her tongue filling her mouth with the taste of rust and metal.

“You’ll speak when spoken to.” Clarke was pretty sure it was the same grounder leader who keeps shoving her around. He spat something that sounded like an expletive, nudging her ribs a little too hard with the toe of his shoe. Clarke had to fight the urge to drive her elbow into his vulnerable and exposed knee. She resisted. Barely.

“Enough, Rederick.” The woman said. Maybe she saw the taut lines of Clarke’s back and sensed how close her warrior was to injury, or maybe she was just tired of the man’s bluster. “Let her speak.”

 _Kind of difficult now_ , Clarke thought sourly, swallowing a globule of blood from her cut and bleeding tongue rather than spitting it onto the floor of the tent. Something told her that won’t go over well.

“I’m not from the mountain.” Clarke said, her voice rough and gravely in her throat. She felt sick, both from the blood flowing down her throat, and the knowledge that this was the first time she’d say this out loud.

“The mountain men are dead. All of them.”

“Lies!” Rederick roared, and Clarke saw the blow coming out of the corner of her eye. She ducked beneath it and flopped on her back to lash out—she caught Rederick on the bone of his kneecap and felt it crunch satisfyingly and dislodge. He went down with a howl, crashing to the ground right beside her. The handle of his knife was tantalizingly close, and Clarke rolled to straddle his stomach, her hands scrabbling at the blade. She had the point at his throat before the rest of the warriors could to put their hands on her. 

He reminded her of Quint, all shaved head and brash anger, looking desperately for an easy target. She could see the rage in his eyes and hear the anger in each labored, pained breath he heaved. His body tensed beneath hers as if to try and buck her off and she pressed her knife into his carotid artery a little harder, drawing a thin line of blood. Rederick looked as though he’s thinking about calling her bluff and making a move anyway, but he sees something that makes the fight go out of him and he relaxes beneath her knife.

It was just as well. She was not bluffing. She wasn't the same girl who had hesitated to kill a man on his knees in the woods, and she doubted she could ever go back. Once your hands were drenched in blood, a little more was nothing.

There was little left of Clarke’s morality now that she had killed children.

“I ask that you forgive Rederick’s indiscretions.” The woman said slowly. “He’s on loan from the River Clan, and their people have long been prey to the Maunon. It would be difficult to explain his death.”

“That’s nice.” Clarke said shortly. “Now how about you let me go, before someone here gets stabbed.”

“I am open to negotiation if you are.” The woman said. Her eyes were steady, calm. “But first, I believe it is customary to exchange names.” The woman spread her palms, and the gold bangles around her wrists jingled with the movement. “I am Luna, the _leda_ of the Boat People.”

Part of Clarke didn't want to play this game. She wanted to back away slowly, still holding Rederick at knifepoint, and then get the hell out of here. But there’s—she does a quick count—eight warriors between her and the door, and she didn't like her odds.

“My name is Griffin.” Clarke said. Somehow it didn't seem prudent to use her first name in this context, like vulnerability. Maybe she was tired of being Clarke. “kom Skaikru.”

“We saw your ship as it fell from the sky.” Luna said. “It fell in Trigedakru territory, so it was not our concern—but even so, tales of your kind have come even this far south. Each of them more outlandish than the last.”

“Like I said,” Clarke said, pressing the knife a little more firmly to Rederick’s neck. Her hands were sweating and she adjusted her grip. “that’s nice.”

“I am wary of anyone from a clan whose children burned 300 of the Commander’s men alive. And who protected a murderer from justice.”

“Fuck off.” Clarke said, suddenly savagely angry. She’s tired of people throwing Finn’s death in her face (god, he died less than a month ago, _fuck_ ), she’s tired of people either praising her for the deaths of the grounders at the dropship, or condemning her for them—as if she had a choice, as if anyone had any sort of choice _fucking_ on the ground.

And she’s so _fucking_ tired of people judging her for surviving.

Clarke saw that serene condescension on Luna’s face and she wanted to break it. It was Clarke pride, welling up and crying out; because it wasn't as though grounder hands were any cleaner than Skaikru and how _dare_ this woman act as if they were. 

“Your Commander, _leda_ ,” Clarke spat. “Left my people to rot in Mount Weather. Shook hands with the man who’d taken your family and friends for years and years and left my “clan” to be carved open like fucking animals.” Clarke’s ears were buzzing, and it was like she couldn't recognize her own voice. Something in her chest was loosening, and Clarke wasn't able to stop talking. “You don’t get to take the high ground here when _your_ people were the ones who betrayed mine. So excuse me if I’m wary of anyone from a clan whose word means _shit_.”

The air in the room was still. Even Rederick, still breathing heavily beneath her, stared at her in something between awe, horror, and anger. 

It was very, very quiet.

And then Luna laughs. Her voice was loud and boisterous, filling the silence until it bursts—the men behind Clarke unfroze and began to mutter among themselves, and Rederick broke his silence to let out a little moan of pain.

Only Clarke stayed silent.

“You have spirit, Griffin kom Skaikru. “ Luna leaned forward, her teeth a split of white between dark lips stretching into a grin. “I will send scouts north to Polis and the Mountain. If you speak the truth, I give you permission to stay as a guest of my kin as long as you please, or leave at the earliest opportunity. If you are wrong…”

There’s that smile again.

“I’ll kill you myself.” 

* * *

A tense week passes. Clarke was returned to her cell where she paces, oscillating between worrying about everything and caring about nothing at all. Her guards changed every few hours, allowing her to relieve herself (but watching closely and never allowing her the opportunity to escape) and stretch outside the stooped confines of the repurposed drain .

Her meals were better fare than she’d experienced since she left Mt. Weather.

Fish wrapped in leaves and steamed, thick stew with a layer of beef and fat on the top that Clarke spooned into her mouth with abandon—fresh bread that didn’t taste like ash and dirt. Clarke felt spoiled and full for the first time in weeks. For the first time in her life, really.

The man who brought the food wasn’t one of her guards. He had a kind smile, whenever he came by to collect Clarke’s used utensils, and he wore some sort of woven cloth belted around his waist instead of armor and scrap. It looked considerably more comfortable in the cloying humidity than what her sweating guards were wearing.

When word came that the scouts had returned, Clarke was quietly released.

The man was there when she stepped out of her cell and wordlessly took her affects from one of her guards. He stood a few yards away, watching her silently.

“Where will you go?” he asked.

Clarke shrugged. “I don’t know.” There really was nowhere else; she couldn’t stomach the idea of going back to Camp Jaha. There were too many memories there, memories that Clarke wasn’t sure she was strong enough to face. Polis… Clarke wasn’t strong enough to face Polis. Not yet.

“There is nothing to the south but waste and swamp.” He said. “Giant beasts wander the wilds.”

“It’s not like I can stay.” Clarke frowned. Despite Luna’s invitation, she felt unwelcome. Where would she stay except her damp cell in the ground?

“I am Solom.” He said. “Arlo is my daughter.” Suddenly, the man’s generosity made much more sense. In her experience, nothing was free on the ground. Still, she appreciated it.

“Is she alright?” Clarke asked. 

“She is eager to be healed.” Solom said, his teeth flashing. “Already complaining of being confined to our quarters.”

“I’m glad she’s alright.” Clarke said. Her anxious weeks of confinement paled in comparison to saving the little girl’s life. 

“It is growing late.” Solom said cautiously. “Too late to start a journey, no matter the destination. “ He gestured toward the ship, the tip of which Clarke could just barely see over the peak of the hill. “Stay the night. In the morning you can be on your way.”

Clarke blinked. “I couldn’t impose-“

“Think of it as repaying a debt.” Solom said. He reached out with a heavy hand to rest it on her shoulder. It was a comforting, if foreign, weight.

“Alright.” Clarke said quietly.

It was only a night, after all.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm in the middle of editing for my disgusting use of present tense. If you see me miss something, email me @ irelendlassie@gmail.com


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